First Tauranga kiwifruit for 2018 sailing tomorrow

As
chocolate eggs are being dispensed this weekend, New Zealand
kiwifruit growers are shipping a much healthier alternative
to Chinese consumers.

The Klipper Stream will carry
New Zealand’s first load of Zespri Kiwifruit from the Port
of Tauranga to China for the year, marking the start of what
looks like another record-breaking season. Loading began
this morning and the ship is scheduled to pass through the
harbour entrance on Good Friday.

This year’s New
Zealand-grown crop is expected to be about 20 million trays
– 70,000 tonnes – higher than last year.

Mount
Maunganui-based global kiwifruit marketing company Zespri
will announce the current season’s sales figures in May
but sales will certainly exceed $2 billion and are expected
to grow in the 2018/19 season.

In 2017, 123 million
trays of New Zealand fruit – that’s more than 430,000
tonnes – were sold and 102 million of those trays came out
of Bay of Plenty soil.

Zespri Chief Executive Dan
Mathieson says both the company’s two biggest markets,
Japan and China, are forecast to grow strongly. Zespri is
also looking for solid growth across the rest of Asia as
well as Europe and North America, where supply did not meet
demand last year.

“Demand for safe, healthy fruit
continues to grow exponentially in China, in terms of both
volume and value. However, our Japanese market is going
great guns as well – we’ve seen a 30 percent sales
growth there over the past four years.

“So our two
major markets are pretty much neck and neck and repeat
purchasing is very strong from our consumers.”

Kiwifruit continues to rank top among all New Zealand’s
horticultural exports, with premium Zespri Kiwifruit sold in
nearly 60 countries.

Nationwide, the industry employs
about 18,000 people; 8000 of them full time. New Zealand’s
2500 kiwifruit growers collectively own about 13,500 ha of
orchard. Zespri has opened the tender for an additional
750ha of SunGold licence this year and, subject to demand,
each year out to 2020.

By 2025, Zespri expects
international kiwifruit sales will hit at least $4.5
billion. In the next 12 years, that growth is expected to
bring more than 29,000 new kiwifruit jobs to regions around
the country, according to a recent University of Waikato
report.

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